Potliquor - Levee Blues (1970)
Potliquor hailed from Louisiana and straddled the line between country, blues, southern rock and hard rock...all the while throwing in horns just to keep things fresh. With a powerful singer in George Ratzlaff, Potliquor were able to muster some pretty inspired moments on vinyl. This, their elusive second album, "Levee Blues" is widely considered their artistic peak. With an ensemble of female background vocalists in tow, the album bears a certain gospel charm that some of their other efforts were missing. This is a passionate and visceral collection of songs and any lover of the aforementioned genres would be well served to check them out. Ripped from vinyl, here it is, "Levee Blues". 192kbps @ http://www.megaupload.com/?d=T82A2ENB
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7 comments:
Thank you for Levee Blues. Been searching everywhere. I will try to see if I can find links for some of your mp3 wants. Thanks again.
The hit song off this album was the song "Cheer". If my memory serves me correctly, it made it somewhere near the bottom of the charts which was quite an accomplishment for a regional band. A little side note, George Ratzlaff (a.k.a Micegiggle) had a vocal style based on one of his heros, Ray Charles, especially on the track "The Train" in which his mouthing of "All aboard" came out like "alla bird". Those of us close to the band nicked him with the moniker "Ray Allabird". When I think back about the band, a few things stand out, Guy's red jacket with the long leather strings on the sleeves (he used to like to spin around and make them swirl), George's Fez-like vest (can be seen on the cover of their initial album "First Taste", and Les's screaming gold top Les Paul. Jerry never seemed like he fit with the rest of the group and George used to warm up his voice singing into a towel and he always injected a B12 shot in his thigh before going on stage. Ah... the 60s!
Cheers.
God bless and thank you for sharing Levee Blues! George Ratzlaff and his band Potliquor was the best band on the planet! The Holy Spirit led me to his music and to except Jesus Christ as my Savior! No one every came as close to Ray Charles' vocals like George Ratzlaff he still blows all singers away! :)
Based on the strength of the single, "Cheer", I bought this album on April 12, 1973. I lived in a small mining town in Ontario, Canada at the time. There was nothing this honest and driving like this on the airwaves at the time. I learned to play all the songs on guitar. I remained the only person around who even heard of this band. In October of 1973, I bought "Louisiana Rock & Roll". Both records got played hundreds of times (yet my vinyl copies are in mint condition).
Last year, I was finally able to buy a digital copy of all (?) their albums on Amazon.
Even though I am not a religious person, I thoroughly enjoyed the band's spiritual leanings, which to me, added some conviction to their music. I can't thank the band enough for providing so many hours of joy and inspiration to my life. My only regret is never being able to see them perform live. Although I have no need for the download, thanks for all the other offerings on your fine blog! (I highly recommend purchasing the albums, in MP3 format. The sonic improvement is worth hearing.) Allabird the train to musical bliss!!!
I am an avid Southern rock archivist and appreciate this incite into a little known group which I was researching. All of your music is appreciated (the Baby Grand downloads especially, whom I met when I worked for Arista back in 70's along with Point Blank, the Outlaws and others)and well documented. thanks for the great website!
I moved to Baton Rouge, La. in the middle of my junior year in high school ['72]. It was there I heard Potliquor for the first time. A friend a mine gave me a copy of Levee Blues which I played so many times I swear you could see right through the grooves to the other side.
Fast forward to May of 2012. My sister-in-law is visiting us here in the Houston area where we now reside and we begin to talk about her work. It turns out her boss is a guy named 'George' who used to be in a band. 'What band?', I asked. "I think it was called Pot Licker or something like that." Small world kind of stuff. Long story short,she calls George on the cell and puts me on with him. We talked for probably 30 minutes. What a nice guy he is. He emailed me a copy of a song written, recorded, mostly performed by him on drums, keyboards and vocals called "Living Water". I have listened to it almost everyday since. It's an awesome song with George's awesome vocals.
He is also sending me a fresh copy of Levee Blues to replace the one I wore out.
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